


Saving Graces

by Berty



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Dancing, Drunken Confessions, First Time, Food, Humor, M/M, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-03-14
Updated: 2005-04-19
Packaged: 2017-10-22 13:27:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/238510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Berty/pseuds/Berty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A chance to let their hair down on a team night out gives Jack pause for thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Saving the Last Dance

As the blast wave of a thumping base line assails my ears when I step out of the truck, I look at my sheepish 2IC with a steely expression.

“This is not the kind of club I would usually frequent, is it Carter?” I ask her shortly.

“No sir,” she smiles, not nearly apologetically enough. A quick glance around the parking lot informs me that it is a popular venue for Colorado Springs’ beautiful people...young beautiful people.

“It’s the kind of club where you dance,” Daniel informs me. Both he and Carter have been insufferable in the truck, bouncy and talking twenty to the dozen all the way here. They eye me with anticipation, wondering if I’m going to bail on them and I do think about it but Daniel looks so hopeful and I love to see that smile on his face...the one that says “Can we, huh? Huh? Can we?”

“Come on Jack, it is Sam’s birthday. It will be fun,” Daniel adds grasping my jacket sleeve and starting to pull me towards the brightly lit entrance. Daniel and fun...two words that don’t often collide. Surely Daniel’s idea of fun involves a library card and a family sized bar of Hershey’s or rearranging his CD collection by genre not artist, perhaps a nice game of chess with yours truly? Surely this kind of place wouldn’t appeal to someone like him? Geeks have down time? This I have to see!

Teal’c takes point as we enter the place and by subtle intimidation i.e. breathing, he secures us a table far from the deafening speakers but still by the dance floor. The place is pretty full and the clientele look prosperous and happy with their lot...and did I mention young? My grey hair must stand out a mile although my choice of outfit is just the right side of smart/casual. Speaking of outfit, Daniel has just shucked his jacket and seems to have had some kind of laundry crisis; his black jeans are way too tight for modesty and the marl grey t-shirt clings across his broad shoulders and chest in a way that is almost unnerving.

As the tempo changes, Carter and Daniel look at each other with excited grins.

“Let’s dance!” Carter commands.

“Coming Jack?” Daniel asks with a sly smirk.

I start to make noises about my knees and they both agree far too quickly and dump their coats on me.

“Would you order me a Southern Comfort please sir?” Sam asks as she takes the willing archaeologist by the hand and starts to drag him away.

“Me too, please!” Daniel calls back, laughing as the press of bodies on the dance floor swallows him up.

“You don’t feel like dancing, big guy?” I ask as I lose sight of the more irrepressible members of my team.

“I am dancing O’Neill,” Teal’c intones. I look at him doubtfully and after a thorough search discover that Jaffa dancing involves changing your weight from foot to foot every fourth bar or so. Subtle doesn’t begin to cover it.

“Course you are,” I agree, dumping the jackets unceremoniously onto the seat before sliding behind the table myself. I just look at my large friend for a while and it’s enough to persuade him that he should sit down too – Colorado Springs just isn’t ready for Chulak Body Popping.

I manage to attract the attention of a waiter and order our drinks, which arrive mercifully quickly. After moaning about Carter and Daniel’s choice of drink being filthy and expensive, I check Teal’c’s root beer is to his liking before settling back in our booth to watch the action and drink my beer. The crowd ebbs and flows and I track the floor with lazy eyes until my attention is arrested by half of Earth’s premier first contact team shaking their thing!

Carter is all smiles and shoulders as she sways to the insistent beat, her strappy top and jeans curving in all the right places. But it is Daniel that has me blindly reaching for my glass, afraid to take my eyes off him.

Daniel dances. I don’t know why this surprises me, but it does, in fact it damn near takes my breath away. His hips seem to have taken on a life of their own as they rock to the rhythm of the music, describing tantalising figures of eight, which burn their way onto my retina in a manner that I know I will still see even when I shut my eyes. His slim waist remains still despite the movement further south and his hands are lightly clasped behind him drawing all the attention to his shoulders and those hypnotic hips. The defined muscles of his arms look amazing under the tight, short sleeves of his shirt and his skin under the hot lights of the club, glows a golden cream. He looks relaxed. He looks happy. He looks HOT!

I need a drink.

Despite the beer my mouth is as dry as a dustbowl. Daniel and Carter continue to gyrate, unaware of the reaction it is causing in the maturity corner of the club. At least I can console myself that I am not the oldest person here and if anyone can challenge Teal’c on that one, I want a list of the supplements they are taking. The effect of Daniel’s motion is anything but mature though and I feel like a teenager, looking at porn magazines, like it’s a forbidden pleasure for which my Catholic upbringing has special levels of hell set aside for me. But try as I might, I cannot drag my eyes from him.

Daniel moves around to accommodate another dancer at that moment and I am rewarded with his rear view. The issue I was having with my pants has now been upgraded to a problem as Daniel’s denim clad ass fills my vision to the exclusion of any other damn thing. I can feel the IQ points dropping away as each sway and glide mesmerises me. I don’t even react when Teal’c helpfully reaches across and closes my mouth for me.

The beat changes again, becoming more frenetic and Carter and Daniel move closer together, grinning like idiots. I can see them both now they have moved around again. Carter is really lost in the rhythm and she moves into Daniel’s space, their bodies never touching but looking for all the world like they were connected. Daniel too is one with the music by now and his movements become more exaggerated and provocative, leaving me breathless. He unclasps his hands, moves impossibly closer to Sam and... Oh Christ, he’s not going to...Oh God! He is! Daniel lifts his arms over his head and his t-shirt and jeans part company revealing a perfect band of taut, pale skin.

I think it’s at this point that I begin to whimper. Thank God for lowered lights and booths with tables, as the problem becomes an all out disaster. Seeking assistance my hand encounters Daniel’s glass of filthy Southern Comfort, which I neck, swiftly followed by Carter’s. Teal’c takes one look at me and disappears, only to reappear a few moments later with a pitcher of iced water, a couple of glasses and another round of drinks. With a tight smile of thanks, I cradle the freezing cold jug in my lap and think about my tax return until I am able to speak in a coherent manner again.  
“So T? You go clubbing much?” I ask in the closest thing to nonchalant I can manage. I train my gaze on his implacable face and resolutely ignore the fact that my civilian consultant is burning up the dance floor and I’m getting off on it like nothing before.

“I do not,” he replies, “But it would seem that both MajorCarter and DanielJackson have frequented such establishments previously.”

I nod sagely and put my chin in my hand to prevent my eyes from straying back to Jackson getting jiggy.

“Indeed it would appear that they are both extremely proficient in this form of dance,” Teal’c continues, obviously warming to he subject. “Observe how much pleasure they are deriving from this occupation.”

Like an idiot I do observe.

The introduction of the next track begins and although I don’t recognise the building piano baseline, most of the rest of the club does and piles onto the dance floor forcing Carter and Daniel ever closer to where we are sitting. My 2IC shouts something to Daniel at which he throws back his head and laughs before casting an amused glance in our direction.

“”They make an aesthetically pleasing couple, do they not O’Neill?” the big Jaffa offers blandly. I grunt in an uninterested manner at which Teal’c smiles in that Sphinxy way he has. Nobody does enigmatic like Teal’c.

But he has got me thinking and I watch Carter now, marking her every move. They smile into each other’s open faces, enjoying each other’s company, enjoying the music. And I know I’m being paranoid but does she have to dance that close to him? And make him laugh like that? I mean, could she be anymore all over him? When she raises her arms and Daniel steps into her embrace and rests his hands on her hips, Teal’c quickly moves all the drinks on the table out of my reach. I have the strangest compulsion to leap up and drag them apart, but settle for taking a long pull on the icy water...straight from the pitcher.

Sam has her back to me now; they can only be 5 yards away. I can see Daniel lean down to say something in her ear that makes his eyes dance with mischievous laughter. I reach across and pointedly retrieve a drink from the Jaffa’s disapproving glare and after a short staring contest which I win – I’m not a Colonel for nothing you know – I turn back to watch my kids dance and come face to navel with a panting, glowing archaeologist.

“You’re hot!’ I squeak, scooting back so I don’t have to address his abs and he frowns at me a little. I quickly retrieve the pitcher of iced water from under the table and pour him a glass. He narrows his eyes at me, but takes the water with a quiet “Thanks, Jack.”

Carter takes a seat beside Teal’c, her face pretty and flushed, but Daniel is doing obscene things with a glass of water and I barely glance at her as she begins to talk. Daniel is holding his glasses in one hand and with the other is tipping the cold drink into his greedy mouth. A rivulet escapes the side of his lips and tracks slowly down his exposed, flushed neck and disappears into his t-shirt leaving a tell tale dark spot on the tight fabric. He lets out a sigh of bliss and drops to the seat beside me, gracefully accepting his Southern Comfort from Teal’c. No one notices when my last IQ point books without a fight and has anyone seen my heterosexuality while we are at it?

Enthusiastically Daniel joins in Sam’s discussion, his face animated and alive in the changing lighting of the club. I have no idea what they are finding to talk about in here and I’m not even trying to keep up until there is a pause in the conversation and three pairs of expectant eyes turn my way. I was quite happy in my little world, dreaming of Danny dancing, just for me, swaying his luscious...

“Ass!” I murmur into the silence. Three pair of eyes do a “WTF?” thing...well, two “WTF?”’s and an “Indeed”.

“Ass...k you if you needed another drink,” I flounder foolishly. “I’m just going to the bar.” Carter and Daniel order another round and I press past Daniel in order to get out of there as fast as possible. I can feel the heat radiating off his body as I do my damndest not to touch him as I brush past. I know he is giving me an odd look; I don’t need to see it. Carter seems oblivious and it could be the lighting but I swear Teal’c is struggling to contain one of his gargantuan grins, the ones he reserves for Jaffa jokes and hopelessly out of their depth Colonels.

I use my time queuing at the bar to regroup and get a grip and by the time I return to the geriatric table I think I have this well enough in hand to last the rest of the evening without disgracing myself – that can wait until I’m alone!

Teal’c is sitting by himself and I can see Carter and Daniel have found themselves a square foot to dance in. Once again my 2IC has her arms loosely around Danny’s neck and her back to me. Daniel has his hands on Sam’s swaying hips and is talking to her while looking over her shoulder. I give him a smile and show him his drink at which he nods and carries on dancing. See? I can do this!

I take my seat again as the music changes once more up-tempo. The beat is driving, thumping and relentless and I watch Daniel adjust his pace and release Sam so they can move more easily to this faster rhythm. The heat and the mingled smells of cigarettes, alcohol and fresh sweat wash over me as I feel the insistent beat slam through my chest. The sea of bodies on the floor moves as one to the demands of the music. I regret the stolen drinks now that their fiery warmth flares around my body, making it hard to concentrate. My eyes range erratically across the heaving mass of dancers until they are caught by another pair of clear blue eyes that act like an anchor in the shifting swell. Daniel’s eyes.

The heat and the scent are forgotten and the other dancers pale to insignificance as my full attention comes to rest on Daniel. His direct gaze is so unguarded but has a question and a challenge in its depths. I can’t look away though I know I should. There is no pressure, no judgement in that cool appraisal, only recognition. I can only guess at what he sees in my eyes, definitely lust, probably fear but I hope a little of what else I am feeling is reflected for him to see. All that I can see is him, the whole place full of noise, lights, odours and sensations are as nothing, narrowed down to those eyes, that small smile and the rippling movement of his body in time to a beat that echoes the thump of my heart.

Carter leans in to Daniel with a few words and shatters the illusion. Suddenly I am back in the moment, the music too loud, the atmosphere too thick and Teal’c looking way to all seeing and smug for my liking.

“What?” I challenge him. He simply raises his infuriating eyebrow and turns back to watch the dancers. Carter has finished talking. Daniel nods and casts a quick look and the sweetest smile I have ever seen my way before he grabs Sam and whirls her away into the crowd.


	2. Saving Face

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daniel is all danced out and now has the munchies. Can the colonel cope with an archaeologist and his pasta?

So, nice restaurant. Italian, not too many Chianti bottles with candles in or pictures of Michelangelo’s David on the walls so I’ll keep quiet. Daniel wanted Chinese, Teal’c wanted a Happy Meal and I wanted steak, but it’s Carter’s birthday and you don’t want to see her carbohydrate deprived, it’s not pretty.

It seems our disco divas have worked up a bit of an appetite as I almost got my hand chewed off when I tried to take that last slice of garlic ciabatta. That same slice that is getting the full attention of Daniel’s mouth right now. He’s savouring it like he hadn’t just scarfed 2 slices already and all the bread sticks Carter didn’t get to first and the dish of marinated olives and like he hasn’t got a bucket of pasta approaching us in the arms of our Antonio Banderas wannabe waiter. He slides Daniel’s plate in front of him and gives him a broad smile.

“Grazie,” Daniel sighs and returns with a smile of his own.

“Parli Italiano?” Antonio asks his eyes opening wide.

“Si, un piccolo. I funzionato una volta in Toscana per un'estate come  
guida di giro. Da dove venite?”

“Io siete stati sopportati in Orvieto, lo conoscete?”

“Sì, sì, Orvieto è bello. Ho visitato una volta. Ha un pozzo di  
stupore...” Daniel pauses.

“Er, Jack?” he asks, pushing his glasses back up his nose, “Could you wait until he puts the food on the table?”

I turn to him still sucking in the spaghetti I had forked off my plate while the boys were getting to know each other, then turn back to Antonio whose mouth is hanging open, rather unattractively. All caught up now, tall, dark and smouldering at my archaeologist? Carter sniggers as I continue to slurp the Carbonara covered pasta until finally, with a flourish, I get to the end and it splatters sauce all up Antonio’s sleeve. Shame.

“Pollo Primavera?” he asks coldly and puts a plate before Sam. “Osso Buco?” he continues and serves Teal’c at the gracious incline of his head. Mine, he just thumps down in front of me, sliding all the food to one side of the plate.

“Buon Apetit!” he says smiling to Carter, Daniel and Teal’c and completely avoiding me.

“Possiamo avere più vino per rendere l'uomo anziano felice?” Daniel asks Antonio giving me a glare. From the snort of laughter that comes from the Mediterranean whelp, I’m guessing that was at my expense, but it had the word vino in it, so it can’t be that bad.

We all dig in and a companionable silence follows for a few minutes. I notice Carter is first to the new wine bottle when it arrives and she serves herself and her dance partner first. I sneak a look at Daniel and the expression on his face is enough to stop me in my tracks. Bliss! Eyes closed, jaw working for a few moments between forkfuls placed delicately on his tongue and accepted between his soft lips.

“Good?” I croak at him.

“Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm,” he agrees, looking at me from under those lowered lashes. Vicious little shit that he is, his humming sets part of me humming along too – damn it, I though I had this under control!

Savagely, I spear some of his pasta off his plate and try it.

“Tastes like mould,” I tell him.

“Truffles, Jack. Very rare, very expensive but worth the trouble,” he opens those too blue eyes innocently, but his sly smirk speaks volumes. From the amount of blood that has just raced south, I am amazed my head hasn’t deflated entirely. He’s...he’s...flirting! No fair! I cast around for something to say and come up with,

“Fwuuuh?”

Carter, bless her regulation cotton socks jumps in and saves me at this point.

“Do you want to try some of mine Sir?” she asks cheerfully. I’m thinking she may have several sheets to the wind and possibly a couple of pillows and a blanket too. She is waving a fork dangerously in my direction.

“No, thank you Carter, I don’t like it. It’s got those things on it,” I tell her, collecting my scattered wits as I drag my attention to dodging her cutlery.

“Do you mean vegetables, O’Neill?” T asks.

“That’s it. Vegetables,” I agree.

“Are you certain that you will not sample it, O’Neill. I am assured that you cannot know you dislike something until you have experienced it.” I look sharply at Teal’c and he just returns my gaze mildly, I have to get him to teach me that one-day. Daniel chokes on his pricey pasta and I fill his glass for him again and pass it to him; who knew Daniel could drink so much and stay upright?

“That’s right Jack, don’t knock it ‘til you’ve tried it!” Daniel beams at me. Man, he is SO asking for it! Payback time!

“Hey, I’ll try anything once,” I swagger.

I snatch the chicken loaded fork out of Carter’s unsteady grasp and rip the morsel off the tines with just my teeth. Making sure the little shit is watching, I chew thoughtfully for a few moments before making a song and dance about swallowing – sure it’s not as pretty as when Danny-boy does it, but at least I’m not just rolling over and taking it any more...and there’s an image I really didn’t need right now. But I think I am getting the desired effect, Daniel’s eyes are wide and when I swallow, so does he in an involuntary reflex. I hand Carter her fork back with a smug smile and then the taste hits me.

“Ew! God! Carter! What is that?” All my calm and cocky is ruined as I hop up and rush off to beg Antonio for a pitcher of water, my second tonight, but this time it’s not the same part of my anatomy that needs assistance.

The rest of the meal passes companionably, Carter apologising for the fennel incident as only a drunken 2IC can – alternately shrieking with laughter, then hugely contrite. Teal’c is quietly demolishing the small Aberdeen Angus he decided on after suggesting this establishment consider introducing the Happy Meal and Daniel is refusing to catch my eye but dissolving into giggles every time Sam tries to start apologising again. I raise an eyebrow at him as he discards another empty wine bottle.

“Jack?” he asks expectantly.

“Nothing!” I reply “But if you barf in my truck, I’m loaning you out to SG-3 on a permanent basis.”

I get a scowl for that. I have an urge to stick my tongue out at him, but squash it just in time. I mean one of us has to be mature here. And it certainly isn’t going to be Daniel who is getting plastered while teaching Sam to say, “My hovercraft is full of eels” in Italian. So Daniel is a dancer and a Monty Python fan, two things I didn’t know about my supposed best friend; maybe I should take him out more often, who knows what else might come up. Pun not entirely unintended.

So after more espresso that a normal human could take and that I was hoping might sober our boy up somewhat, we find ourselves back out on the street. It must be getting on for midnight by now, but Carter and Daniel are still going strong and make whiney noises when I say I’m taking them home.

“But Sir, we’ve got three days down time,” Carter pleads. But I’m being strong, despite the pouty thing from Daniel and the whinging thing from the birthday girl. Teal’c says nothing in a stunning display of no help whatsoever, merely folds his hands behind his back and walks beside me. I’m grateful that the kids quit moaning after a few minutes and fall silent as we walk back to the truck. I pass the keys to Teal’c with only a minor warning about watching my truck before I turn to help my drunken teamates into the car and assess how close to being sick Daniel is with the skinful he must have put away tonight.

“Err...Murray?”

“Yes, O’Neill?”

“Where are the others?”

“To whom are you referring?” he asks in that tone of voice that makes me want to bang my head on something hard.

“Carter and Daniel, where are they?” I enunciate as clearly as I can, I’ve only had a couple of drinks, but it’s been a heck of a night for surprises and I’m slightly edgy.

“I believe they have entered an establishment called “Crazy Jack’s” in an attempt to evade a ‘Colonel Curfew’.”

Crazy Jack’s turns out to be a bar we passed on the way to the truck and it looks like any other downtown bar in any other town in the US at midnight on a Thursday. The jukebox is churning out a list of tired rock music, it’s smoky, it smells of stale beer and only the poor bastards with no place better to be remain. The only difference I can discern is that this bar has an astrophysicist teaching the barman bad words in Italian and a Doctor of Archaeology and Linguistics doing his best to get killed by the only other inhabitant of the Springs who can compete with Teal’c on the “Don’t talk to me unless you want to spend lots at the Orthodontist’s tomorrow” stakes. I leave Teal’c to extricate Daniel from his latest friend and steer Carter to a table, firmly ordering a round of Cokes over my shoulder at the bewildered barman.

When I get back from the john, I feel my last thread of control neatly snipped as I spy Daniel concentrating hard on trying to get quarters into the jukebox without falling over, Carter “surreptitiously” doctoring the Cokes with Bacardi and Teal’c setting down to a game of pool with the guy Daniel was talking to whose name, a giggling 2IC tells me, is Skank.

“Are you sure that’s not Hank?” I ask her slumping into my chair.

“No, Skank! It says it on his forehead,” she hoots. I look – she’s right. I drink the doctored Coke. In one.

Sam remembers a word she hasn’t taught the poor barman and skips off to further broaden his horizons just as Danny-boy arrives at the table in a smiley heap. I mean, he’s not the most co-ordinated guy at the best of times, but when he’s inebriated, well, frog in a blender doesn’t really do it justice.

“Hey Jack,” he beams, “having fun?”

I wave an imaginary flag, which has him snickering; his nose all scrunched up and cute looking. I groan inwardly; since when did I find a drunken, giggly Daniel cute? I will admit that I love the guy, how can you not? He’s honest, brave to the point of abject stupidity, committed, hardworking and eager to please...on his terms, he is also pissy, over educated, cranky in the mornings and male. Did I mention male? Because it sure is a sticking point for me.

Looking at guys in that way is something I gave up a long time ago to pursue my dream of flying. I can do discipline and liking my bed partners to have curves is a discipline that became a habit, even a pleasure. But Daniel changed all that. Dragged from retirement and a date with my handgun to meet this geeky, brilliant, infuriating, insightful man, he had me off balance from the second he said he knew how to get us back from Abydos. It turned out to be an “economy of truth” as he later put it. He had no idea what to expect, but he knew he was the man most likely to figure it out and by that time we were friends and I was dead meat.

I won’t say I missed him, the year he was on the other side of the galaxy. He crossed my mind from time to time and I was pleased to see him despite my acting out when we gated back to Abydos. But the anticipation of getting to know him better all went to hell within hours as his wife and brother-in-law were snatched, the catalyst for the last 4 years of our lives. And in that time Daniel has been a constant in my life, our friendship never simple but always easy. We’ve faced some shit together, this odd connection between us compelling us to stay close, knowing that is what keeps us strong enough to carry on. We trip merrily from one place to the next, one problem to another, never pausing to analyse our bond or contemplate what it means. And that is how we got this far; a watched pot never boils, so we don’t watch. There sure is a hell of a lot of steam in here tonight though.

I look across at Daniel and just for a moment I catch a glimpse of the shining intellect behind those dilated pupils before he gives me a sappy grin and rests his cheek in his hand to look around the bar. Suddenly he sits upright as the jukebox changes tracks.

“My song!” he yelps and brings the full force of his azure gaze to bear on me. Oh no! Crap! No, no, no, no, no!

“Dance with me Jack!” he begs. He throws himself off his chair with a whoop that is abruptly cut off when he stumbles and disappears under the table. Casting a long suffering look around the bar to anyone interested, I get up and move round to where the boy was last seen, put my hands on my knees and stoop slightly. Suddenly I am knocked backwards and smothered in 180lb of prime archaeologist. His arms are twined around my neck, his head on my shoulder and he’s swaying before I can catch my breath.

The thing about dancing with someone who is almost the same height as you, and it’s not something I’ve ever really had to think about before, is that being of a similar height all the points of contact on their body sort of line up with all the points of contact on yours. So quite apart from having the air knocked from my lungs, I am struggling with the reality that I have a nose full of soft brown hair, his chest and belly pressed against mine, his thighs brush against my thighs every time he moves and the insistent bulge at the level of my groin must be his... and whatever it is, it’s getting bigger!

I think my brain must have switched off for a few minutes because I just stand there, attached to my team linguist turned limpet and let him sway me back and forth to the strains of an old Springsteen number. He sighs and wriggles a little closer, sticking his nose against my neck and gusting warm breaths through my shirt and straight onto skin that is suddenly burning. I bring my arms to settle gently around his waist. I inhale deeply into the silky, short hair that tickles my cheek and under the salty smell of a dance sweat and the bitterness of the cigarette smoke I can smell Daniel: his bergamot shampoo, the clinging scent of all the coffee he gets through in a day and a warmth of skin that spikes straight to my groin making me groan a little.

I know I should be thinking fast right now. I should be finding a way to get out of Daniel’s arms and finding a joke to explain away the fact that I was aware of his obvious arousal. He must know this is dangerous. I should be gently but firmly letting him go, letting him know that I’m not interested and that he’s drunk and his come ons are something I’m going to be ribbing him about privately for months to come. But I can’t...and God help me I don’t want to. I have never felt so safe in my life, so free and yet so protected. I just want to stay here forever, in the arms of my drunk, horny best friend, no sobering up and realising what he’s done, no court marshal, no judgemental society, just this. But I know that can never happen.

“Daniel,” I murmur taking one last lungful of his scent and I rub his back. “I think it’s time you went home buddy.” I take hold of his shoulders and gently try to push him away from me. He growls and hangs on tighter still. My balls tighten at the needy sound.

“Daniel!” I say louder. He has to let go right now, or I’m lost. His head bobs up and I’m eye to eye with the sharpest, most forthright gaze I’ve ever seen, like he’s got a window right into my soul and I’m laid bare. He looks at me for an endless moment, then his eyes sort of lose focus and he smiles an enormous soppy smile.

“J’ck,” he beams, like he hasn’t seen me in days.

“Yeah, buddy!” I agree patiently. “Good old Jack. Taking you home now Danny-boy.”

“Stay over at your place?” he asks. Fuck, no!

“Errrr, not tonight Daniel. Not a good time,” I tell him. Too much is going on in my head and my jeans, I can’t trust myself to be around him any longer tonight. He looks like he’s about to argue when we are tackled from behind.

“Group Huuuuuuuuuuuuggggggg!” Carter shrieks into the back of my skull as she squeezes the air out of my lungs again with her deceptively powerful arms around my waist. Daniel’s eyes sparkle as he tightens his grip again on my neck.

“Carter...Carter, get off!” I shout, but she’s feeling no pain. I’m considering kicking her shins when more massive arms enfold my head as Teal’c expresses his appreciation of all things SG-1 in a new and exciting Tau’ri manner. I stand there having the crap hugged out of me by the people I love most in this or any other world and thinking things can’t get any worse when my face gets up close and personal with a sweaty male armpit; Skank is feeling the love.

To say the drive home was uncomfortable would be inaccurate. Only I was uncomfortable. Teal’c drove, ignoring my pathetic attempts to ‘help’ him from the back seat with useful pointers about my beloved truck. Carter, after having claimed the front seat in a sneaky end run manoeuvre, occupied herself with my CD and radio. Daniel decided that he wanted to sing along to the songs Carter was playing; unfortunately he wanted to sing them while slumped on my shoulder getting all snugly. Hence my discomfort. Nice, big, roomy back seat in my truck and me squashed into the door, covered in linguist! He even got himself out of his belt on the other side of the car, where I put him and buckled himself into the middle one while I was walking round to get in. I didn’t even realise until the grin – the one with the screwed up nose and crinkly eyes - loomed up at me and started singing ‘It’s Raining Men’.

I was so involved in ignoring Daniel’s crooning in my ear and his warm, solid weight tucked up against me, not to mention his hand rubbing circles on my thigh, that I was shocked to find Teal’c pulling up in my drive.

“Won’t you need me to help you get Daniel to bed first T? We should swing by his place first,” I tell my massive friend. At this point the dead weight on my shoulder digs out another of his miraculous recoveries and releases himself from the belt and scoots out of the car and up the path to my house, blowing birthday kisses at Carter and waving merrily at T.

“Danieljackson directed me to bring him here, he informed me he wished to sleep at your place tonight, O’Neill,” Teal’c intones, eyeing me implacably in the rear-view mirror. I really need to get a copy of ‘Jaffa for Dummies’ because I can’t tell if he is dissing me or not – even after all this time. “Should you not be attending to him? He appears to be knocking on your front door...with his head.”

“Fine,” I snap, I’m too tired to fight and if I don’t do something about the situation in my Levis I’m going to have permanent damage to part of me I prefer...undamaged. So I dump Daniel in the spare bed and have myself a cosy evening with my right hand. Life sucks.

“I will return tomorrow with your truck, O’Neill,” Teal’c tells me as I begin the hobble up to my path; it is a measure of how distracted I am that I just wave him off.

Daniel has his forehead against my front door and I have to gently topple him and accept his weight to get my key in the door.

“I love you, J’ck,” he declares wetly onto my neck, “Always have.”

“Backatcha,” I murmur as the door swings open and we stagger into the hall. I prop Daniel against the opposite wall and return to close and lock the door. I watch Teal’c carefully reverse my baby back out of the drive, slowly and reverently then with a grin the size of an aircraft hangar directly into my eyes, he floors it and spins the wheels before screeching off down the road in a cloud of vaporised rubber and the strains of “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.” I briefly close my eyes and from behind me comes the sound of a thump and a muffled ouch as Daniel rediscovers gravity. It’s gonna be a long night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With thanks to Pie and Pepe for beta services.


	3. Saving the Best 'Til Last

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sleep? Who needs it? Besides it's time for confessions.

For a guy whose specialist subjects are sitting on his ass translating stuff and unearthing other stuff with tiny brushes, Daniel sure does weigh a lot. God, if I didn't know better I would say he was being deliberately awkward as I try and get him along the hall to the spare bedroom. He is a seething mass of arms and legs, none of them going in the right direction and his litany of endearments, although very touching, are not what my poor heart needs to hear right now.

I am doing my level best to stuff this whole "awareness of Daniel" thing back in the box it jumped out of so inconveniently earlier this evening. One direct, assessing look from the boy as I watched him dance with Carter and suddenly I want to pick out curtains with him? There must have been more in that damn box than I realised. It's like something special from the past you keep in the attic, you know it's always there but as long as you don't see it and you sure as hell don't touch it, it can't hurt you. Well this particular box is well and truly broken open, contents spilled and we're headed for stomping the box to bits too, if we're not careful.

And it's hurting me.

"Jaaaaaa-aaaaackkkkk," Daniel sing-songs in my ear.

I've never seen him this wasted and my uptight don't-need-nothing archaeologist is suddenly full of playful touches and heartfelt declarations of our undying friendship. He is so going to hate himself in the morning.

"Okay, Danny boy, let's get you into bed," I tell my sweetly smiling armful, as we fall through the door of my spare room.

"Well, finally," he giggles. "Thought I was going to have to draw you a diagram!" He plants a big wet kiss on my cheek and lets go of me. He topples slowly backwards onto the bed before becoming still for the first time in what feels like all evening. I stand and stare at him, doing my best impression of a carp - that glassy-eyed, mouth-agape, suffocating kind of thing. He's not just flirting anymore, not just a comfortable, laugh-it-off, doesn't-mean-anything-anyway joke. No, we've moved on into the heavy stuff.

He's trying to seduce me? Ohmygod! He's trying to seduce me!

Well woo-fucking-hoo! Seems maybe Daniel has the hots for me in roughly the same manner as I do for him and my heart leaps and falters in a way that makes me feel light headed - or is that nauseous?

And then reality bites me in the ass. A drunken Daniel Jackson feeling amorous and a sober Daniel Jackson feeling anything for me at all, are two opposites ends of a wormhole. I mean, let's face it, the guy doesn't get out a great deal. Maybe if you have a few drinks too many and you are among friends, even your grumpy, dumb, old CO will look good to you. The guy is utterly oblivious to the way he looks himself and the way people react around him. If he gave the slightest indication that he was in the market for some company, he'd be beating them off with a stick – and I'd be picking them off with a P-90. I have to admit I haven't exactly been trying to get him to open his eyes to the opportunities out there. I know – I'm a dog in a manger – but having to watch him make eyes at Ke'ra made me want to shoot her, even before we knew about the whole here-again, gone-again Destroyer of Worlds thing. And don't think I don't know that Aris Boch was planning on keeping Daniel no matter what he was worth to the Goa'uld, either. A day's rations, my ass!

So, getting Daniel to bed, then a nice cold shower for me are the only things on my to-do list. Regrettably my team linguist is NOT that list, and it's with a sick feeling in my guts that I pull off Daniel's shoes and his glasses while he lies there thoughtfully watching me.

"You're my best friend, J'ck!" he tells me quietly.

"Yeah, you too, Daniel," I say gruffly. "Are you okay like that?"

"Jeans are too tight," he pouts. No shit! I've been counting the hairs on his thighs all evening! He struggles with the metal button a few times before subsiding onto the bed in a pathetic heap, looking up at me through those ridiculously long lashes.

"Ah, crap, Daniel!" I bleat, knowing what comes next.

"Please, Jack," he whines. "I can't sleep in them."

"Fine," I snap and lean over him to reach his waistband. Steeling myself, I grab the stiff denim and attempt to yank it apart, but the sneaky little shit twines his arms around my neck, pulls my head to him and leans up to capture my lips in a brief but all too perfect kiss. His button comes loose and I stagger back, hot and confused, my traitorous tongue greedily lapping the taste of him from my lips.

His eyes are twinkling in the darkened room and he looks deliciously rumpled, sprawled out on the bed like that. I'm panting like I've run a mile with a full pack on. And damn it, I'm trembling!

"G'night, Daniel," I say quickly, and retreat to the well-lit, Daniel-free safety of the hallway and try to stop shaking. When I realise it's not about to happen anytime soon, I march to the bathroom, slam the door and dial the shower to its coldest setting before stripping off my shirt.

I hear a couple of dull thumps from the spare bedroom and pause with my jeans halfway down my thighs. More thumps and a snigger. Crap. What's he up to now? I struggle to yank my pants back up, tugging viciously when my cock pathetically denies the inevitable and struggles to evade the confines of my jeans. To be honest, being in a state of semi-hardness or ball-busting solidity for the last four hours has made me just a tad tetchy with this recalcitrant part of my body and I ruthlessly shove it back inside.

I hear music coming from the living room and make my way there to find Daniel dancing again. He has found the lamp beside the sofa and the muted light throws his swaying body into sharp relief. He's all soft shadows and gold highlights, the hollow of his throat, the curve of his shoulder, the line of his inner thigh and the swell of his ass all hypnotically moving in and out of the subtle illumination. He hasn't bothered to re-button his jeans, they sit low on his hips and it takes all my willpower to avoid staring at the exposed glimpse of creamy skin and soft dark hair. He is breathtakingly beautiful and it's a minute or two before I can get enough spit in my mouth to speak.

"Daniel?" I meant it to come out as threatening, but even my voice betrays me now and I think I can safely say that it was a husky whisper. I'm going down and there's not gonna be a blaze of glory.

He turns to face me, never missing a beat. Somewhere a part of me is stunned by how easy it seems to be for him to stay upright now, when five minutes ago I had to practically carry him from the front door. He gives me a dreamy, closed mouth smile.

"Come, dance with me 'gain," he murmurs, stepping up to me and invading my personal space, but not actually touching me. He smiles right into my face, keeping his eyes locked on mine as he moves with the music. I'm amazed he can keep the rhythm as my heart is hammering to get out of my chest so hard; it has to be drowning out the song.

"Didn't know you could dance, Jack," he says, although I haven't moved.

"Can't," I say stupidly and it's true – normally I have so little skill, Sara used to disown me at functions that demanded we strut our stuff. But for the endless two minutes in that bar tonight it was suddenly easy; each time he moved, I reacted instantly, accommodating him, complementing him like I was born to do it. A thrill tingles through me at the memory and I want to feel that connection to him again no matter what it costs. I awkwardly raise my arms to him and he steps into the embrace and the space between us is like it never existed.

I'm not consciously aware of when the music stops, so I can't say how long we have been swaying like this in the quiet shadows of my living room, but however long it is – it isn't enough – nowhere near. That sensation of safety I briefly tasted earlier this evening has settled on me now like a caress that I have somehow craved all my adult life. Daniel knows me, knows everything about me. Even Sara couldn't make that unhappy claim. I would come home, injured or thin or sunburned and she would look at me with compassion and try to fix me with her love, but when I would wake shaking and sobbing in the night after dreams I couldn't tell her about, I could see the fear that underlay the support in her eyes.

Daniel has been there. He has the same dreams. We have both held the other while the tremors subsided and whispered reassurances to bring the other back from the dark places. Daniel has seen every facet of my personality, the good ones and the not so good. He is not afraid of the blackest parts of my soul. The feeling of safety stems from that, I'm sure. No pretence, no making it okay for the onlooker, just the truth and knowing that they are strong enough to take it; Daniel is the strongest person I know.

My serenity in Daniel's embrace is short lived though, when he starts singing the words to some old Sinatra song. Daniel doesn't sing, just like he doesn't translate Monty Python into sundry European languages unless he is as drunk as a lord. And no matter how much I want it to be true, he doesn't love me either, not in the way I have come to realise I want him to.

I savour his affectionate nature for one more moment, just one last minute, before I have to admit that tomorrow he's going to hate himself and if I don't stop him now, he's going to hate me too.

"Bed time, Daniel," I tell him, disentangling myself from his insistent hugging.

"No more dancing?"

"We're all done dancing for tonight," I say reluctantly, so he pouts and looks a little sulky.

Somehow I manage to turn him and get an arm around his waist to lead him back to the spare room. I watch from the door this time as he sits on the bed. I can't trust myself to be any closer right now. I wish him goodnight, shut the door and return to the living room to turn off the lamp and the CD player before I go back to the bathroom and take that shower.

Then, still feeling the bracing effects of the icy water, all is peaceful as I listen at the door of the spare room. I pad quietly into my bedroom thinking I'll put a glass of water, some painkillers and a bowl by Daniel's bed before I turn in. I drop my towel and slip on some boxers and a t-shirt before I notice that a smiley, smug-looking archaeologist is watching me from my bed.

"Hi!" he waves complacently and...nakedly?

"Daniel!" I yelp, "I thought you couldn't undo your own buttons."

He has the decency to look a little sheepish as he guiltily eyes the pile of his clothes on the floor. "Ah...yes, well movisation is a great thing. Moveration. Motor..." His brow creases in concentration as he struggles.

"Motivation?" I suggest helpfully.

"Yesh!" he positively beams. "Come to bed." He snuggles under the sheets at this point, mercifully covering all the skin that was on show before and making me think that I should just take a pillow and sleep in a cold bath if he is going to be in the house tonight. His hair, nose and eyes are all I can see and he watches me as I exasperatedly run my hands though my damp hair.

"You're drunk, Daniel," I tell him and I can hear the disappointment in my voice. "You don't know what you are doing."

"Wanna sleep with you, J'ck!" he frowns over the quilt. "We do it all the time at work."

"This is different. This is..." I don't know what to tell him. Although this means nothing to him, scratching an itch, right place, right time, it suddenly means everything to me.

"Serious?" Daniel offers.

"Yeah, serious. Ask me again when you're sober," I say quietly as I kick his clothes aside and steel myself to drag a naked, horny, drunken six feet nothing of my dreams back to his own bed.

"Will you say yes?" he shoots back immediately, sitting up and taking me by surprise. I look at him frankly for a second, before the sappy grin reasserts itself on his face.

"We'll talk about it tomorrow," I tell him gruffly, while calling down blessings from any deity, real or imagined, for him to remember this conversation fondly in the morning. It's not befitting my rank to beg, but if, "Oh pleeeeeeeeease, oh please, oh please, oh please!" will swing it, point me in the right direction.

"So are you gonna come quietly?" I ask him and I know the second the words are out of my mouth that they are a mistake. There is a moment of stunned silence, then Daniel shrieks...yes, shrieks with laughter and the whole bed shakes as he convulses with giggles. I try to hold it together, but seeing his pink face pop out over the quilt to see my reaction does for me and I too am rocking with laughter, staggering to the bed to sit down before I fall down. This goes on for a while, every time one of us calms down the other sniggers again and off we go for another few minutes. Finally, exhausted we both fall quiet.

"Daniel..." I begin.

"Just sleep?" he asks immediately. I turn around to see his dishevelled hair and shining eyes peering at me, looking so hopeful. That was a mistake – I shouldn't have looked. He undoes me!

"I don't think..."

"Please, just sleep. I always sleep better when you're close," he tells me softly. "I'll stay over here, I'll be good. Sleep," he explains as he settles into his pillow. Sneaky little bastard, I should call him on it. He's using every trick in the book to get his own way, it's underhanded and it's cheating! I mean, go the whole hog why don't you and... awwww CRAP! He's biting his lip. Damn he's good!

Like a lamb to the slaughter I lie down stiffly...yeah, yeah, I know... with my back to him, and feel the comfortable weight of Daniel-warmed bedclothes settle across my shoulders as he tucks me in.

"Daniel, hand!" I warn and he reluctantly takes the offending appendage off my neck. A stillness falls. My nose is full of the scent of him and I feel the heat of his body on my skin, although he is as good as his word and stays on his side of the bed. He shifts around a little, getting comfy and I'm starting to think this wasn't such a bad idea after all. Maybe I've been reading this wrong all night, maybe he is just a friendly and flirty drunk and is not looking for a quick tumble. I start to feel bad for underestimating him yet again when his voice, startlingly close to my ear makes me think again.

"I can't sleep, can I have a hug?" he asks.

"No, go to sleep!" I bark at him, pissed that he made me jump – again!

"Please, Jack. Then I'll be asleep in no time at all," he informs me, as if this is perfectly reasonable.

"Daniel, I say again, you are drunk and you are out of line! Go to sleep!"

"Would you if I were sober?" he asks, way too close to my ear again.

"You're not."

"But if I were?" he persists. My skin is still cool from the now pointless cold shower and it seems to be hyper aware of the warmth just an inch or two away, making me yearn to roll into his scalding touch.

"No," I lie and even to my ears it's a pathetic one.

Daniel seems to consider this... well he's quiet for a minute anyway. Then, as if deciding something, he scoots up behind me and all his deliciously warm skin is plastered against my back and thighs and he snakes a hand around my waist. His soft hair tickles my shoulders when he snuggles his head against my neck and whispers, "Goodnight, Jack. Love you."

I squeeze my eyes tightly shut and try to ignore the feeling of rightness that washes over me and nearly takes my breath away.

"Daniel, let go," I force out, I don't know how.

"Comfy," he growls.

"It's not right. You're going to hate yourself in the morning and probably me as well," I tell him hoarsely.

"Never, never gonna happen," he sighs.

Suddenly it's all too much - the smell of him, the feel of his skin. I have to get out and I push back against him with a shoulder and turn to face him so I can hold him off me.

"It's not right, Daniel," I grate at him and I throw off the covers tangled over my legs. I can wedge a chair under the door handle of the spare room while he sleeps off this amorous bullshit and then see how much he still needs that hug in the morning. My guess is that he'll be gone before I wake and will call later to apologise.

While my hands are busy with the sheets, they are unable to hold down my drunken linguist who impressively quickly grabs my face and plants a kiss on me that leaves no room for misinterpretation. His hot tongue butts against my lips insistently until I groan and relax into his grasp and he takes the opportunity to slip into my mouth with a possessiveness that shocks me and excites me in equal measure.

"God, Daniel," I whimper when he finally lets me go, his eyes glittering in the darkness and a soft clever smile on his bruised lips. "You're out of it, if I let you...."

"I'm not," he states simply.

"Not?" I ask stupidly, completely wrong-footed by this infuriatingly gorgeous man.

"I'm not drunk, Jack," he quietly admits, his eyes wary as he sizes up my reaction.

"But all the wine and the drinks at the club...."

"I had one Southern Comfort about five hours ago and two sips of wine."

"But you..."

"Do I taste drunk?" he asks, subtly licking his own lips. I copy his action and he's right. I can taste coffee and a slight sweetness, but nothing that suggests that he has drunk what he had me thinking he did.

I look at him through narrowed eyes and now I know it was an act it has all become so plain to see. The sleepy eyes and soppy grins have been replaced by a calm assessing look and his expansive clumsy gestures have become an unnatural stillness as he awaits my reaction. And I'm not a man to disappoint. I yank the remaining sheets from my legs and throw myself out of the bed, breathing hard and at a loss to know how I could have been so taken in by his theatrics. Here comes the reaction.

"Of all the fucking stupid things you have ever done, this one has to be the most idiotic, Jackson!" I bellow. "What the fuck you were hoping to achieve by this I don't know." He just lays back in his pillows... my pillows ...and watches, his expression completely unfathomable to me.

"Are you trying to get me a court martial? 'Cos I'm telling ya, Daniel, as desperate as I am and as good as a one night deal with you sounds, it's not worth my career." As if to disagree with my mouth, the more... interested part of my anatomy makes another bid for freedom at this point. Apparently it deems one night with Daniel is a good enough reason to throw away my livelihood and possibly my liberty. And my sneaky bastard of an ex best friend still just watches me, his eyebrows quirking slightly at the activity in my shorts, but saying nothing. Damn him, why doesn't he fight back?

His silent treatment gives me nothing to react to and this just makes me angrier. I spin on my heels and start to stalk around the bedroom. I want to bang my head on something hard, or punch something soft or...or...blow something up! How can I have ignored all the signals I was getting this evening? Two or three times I caught myself wondering if he really was as smashed as he was letting on, but each time he did something outrageous and totally out of character to throw me off again. Like dance or sing or... kiss me. I've been played for a fucking idiot all night.

"Do you have any idea what you are doing? Fucking playing with fire, Daniel!"

I don't know if it's that I am trained to recognise this kind of bullshit and didn't, or if it's because Daniel did it that pisses me off more. I mean a highly decorated, Special Ops trained USAF Colonel should be able to spot that his favourite dweeb is acting; but I think it's the fact that it's Daniel that had me on the ropes even before the first bell. The guy has been running rings round me ever since I first laid eyes on him. He's like nothing I have ever encountered before and I don't dare measure him by any standard I would apply to anyone else. He just doesn't fit in to any of the categories I know.

Daniel runs when he should walk, he stops to talk when he should be running, he has never followed an order he wasn't going to do anyway and he will not betray his principles, no matter the cost – he basically drives me insane. So he has kind of blazed a trail through my nicely ordered existence like the best sort of tornado and left me on my ass in the mud with a big 'what the fuck?' grin on my face more times than I can count. I guess I should just chalk up tonight to a Jackson F5. But damn it, I'm massively pissed with him still and his smug silence.

"I mean how hard up do you think I am? Do you seriously think that a quick tumble with you is the answer to my prayers? Poor old Jack, hasn't had any in God knows how long, think I'll seduce him and put him out of his misery? Is that what you were thinking?"

Daniel's eyes track me around the dark room, only the light from the hall casts its feeble glow over the bed and my silent archaeologist. I stride around, unwilling to look at him, scared at what I will see there.

"Because I'm not that pathetic! I don't need a pity fuck, Daniel, so you can just get dressed and leave," I shout and move towards him to get him out of my bed. Unfortunately the effect of my dramatic and instantly regretted declaration is somewhat ruined by Daniel's jeans, which choose this instant to tangle themselves around my feet and send me sprawling onto the floor beside the bed, flat on my back.

After a tense few moments of quiet, Daniels head slowly comes into view over the side of the bed. I resolutely refuse to meet his eye and continue to stare at the ceiling as if that was exactly what I had planned all along.

"Finished?" he asks quietly, after regarding me for a while. At least he isn't laughing.

"Possibly," I admit grudgingly. His head disappears and I hear him settle back into the pillows. When I pick myself up, he has turned back the sheets for me in an obvious invitation to join him. I hesitate under his placid gaze before accepting the inevitable and sliding into the bed beside him. Tonight, tomorrow, a kiss, a lifetime, let's face it, it's whatever he wants.

We lay side by side, not touching or even looking at each other. Now I've stopped the whole hissy fit thing, I have time to consider this evening's occurrences more rationally. To go from a deep but purely platonic love to being here in bed with Dannyboy in the space of one evening would give anyone cause for a few histrionics. When our gazes locked on that dance floor tonight, we set in motion a course of events that has been threatening to bubble to the surface for some time now. His recognition of my interest in him and his reaction to it were an accident waiting to happen. So he flirted and teased and kissed me and told me he loved me, testing the waters, pushing the boundaries, making sure, all under the pretence of drunkenness. But the question still has to be....

"Why?"

Daniel rolls onto his side to face me, propping his chin in his hand. The muted light through the open door highlights the gold strands in his short brown hair and makes his skin glow. His eyes are soft and his expression hopeful.

"We don't have forever, Jack," he says simply.

I roll onto my side in a mirror image of his posture and hold his soft gaze. Leave it to Daniel to say something so fucking profound that it leaves me speechless.

"If being on SG-1 has taught me nothing else, I have learned that our lives are so fragile and fleeting," Daniel sighs. "A few months ago, when you and Teal'c took that little trip out to Jupiter in that modified glider?"

I suppress a shudder as I recall the freezing hours spent being carried by the Apophis Express further and further from Earth and hope, but mostly from the man now inexplicably in my bed. The pain in Daniel's eyes is clear as I nod my understanding.

"Thought we'd had it that time," I murmur.

"Me too," Daniel agrees, his voice breaking suspiciously. "It got me thinking. What if one of us died and you never knew?"

"Knew?" I ask, but his eyes give me all the answer I need. Such a depth of longing there, such a sense of devotion. How can I have not seen it before?

"Knew what you are to me," Daniel smiles. "So when I saw you watching me tonight and I thought that maybe I was the same thing to you, I just had to find out - I had to know."

"So... not a pity... not a one night... you want..." I'm sure the sentence is in there somewhere but it's kind of hard to get out with my heart in my throat as it is.

"No," he says with a quiet certainty.

My heart thuds painfully back into my chest and tries to swell beyond the confines of my ribs. "So you pretended to be drunk," I sigh, still feeling like a prick to have been taken in so damn easily. Being around Daniel has always been dangerous to my health as he is so damn flippant with his; I have to make up for his lapses in concentration. But now I have admitted to myself that he is even more than my pain-in-the-ass best friend and he is able to pass off his piss poor acting skills as a drunk and still take me in, I should definitely think about retiring – I'm obviously losing my edge.

I've been quiet for a while and Daniel is doing the lip-biting thing again.

"What are you thinking?" he asks, bringing me back to the here and now. His voice is level but his eyes betray his anxiety.

"I'm wondering why I let you do this to me," I tell him, smiling to let him know we'll be okay. "You've been running me ragged since the day I met you."

"Oh, that's simple. It's because you love me," he says confidently.

"And you know this how?"

"Nobody else has ever put up with my crap for this long before," he grins and I feel my guts clench as the truth of his throwaway line hits me like a stone. I wonder if he realises the effect his words have on me. This is the longest adult relationship of his life; for all that it was a friendship until tonight. How this has come about is beyond my grasp, such a shining soul as Daniel's should never have had to endure the shit he has weathered. Yet he comes through, again and again, with his spirit intact and his integrity further strengthened. He astounds me. This guy stuff is new to me, so instead of crushing him to me and refusing to relinquish him ever again, I reach out a shaking hand and place it softly against his cheek. He smiles and presses into my palm.

"What are you thinking?" I ask in return when the quiet drags out too long.

"I'm thinking we're never going to be able to go back to that restaurant again – I tipped my wine in their plant pots all night," Daniel sniggers.

"That stuff wasn't cheap you know!" I sniff at him.

"I'm worth it," he responds with a raised eyebrow.

"Like truffles? Very rare, very expensive but worth the trouble?" I ask him. His eyes dance as he recalls our discussion in the restaurant. See, I do listen to him! "Well, we're not going back there again anyhow," I continue.

"Why? Didn't you like it?" Daniel looks surprised.

"Food was fine, it was the overfriendly waiting staff that I object to," I tell him sullenly, dropping my hand to the sheets between us.

"What?" Daniel crinkles his brow at me. See? Not a clue when people are coming on to him.

"Antonio Banderas from Orvietto," I explain.

Daniel takes my hand and twines his long fingers through mine."Antonio Banderas is Spanish and how did you know the waiter was from Orvietto?" His voice is deceptively smooth.

Can I admit that I read about the place on a wine label once and recognised the name? "Lots about me you don't know, Daniel," I say loftily, rubbing my thumb across the back of his hand.

"You speak Italian?" Daniel asks and I can hear the scepticism dripping from his lips.

"Is that so shocking?" I ask him, trying to look offended. I mean some of that Ancient he made me learn while I was looping (in more ways than one) has to crop up in Italian, as it's Latin based - didn't I read that on a cereal packet somewhere? Note to self – buy Teach Yourself Italian CD's tomorrow.

Thankfully he leaves the conversation there and drops his eyes to our hands joined in front of us.

"I love you," he says quietly not lifting his gaze from the only part of us that is touching. "Now you know. So if anything happens..." He pauses as I shift slightly, uncomfortable at the turn of the conversation . I know how risky what we do is, I cope with it by not thinking about it a whole lot. Daniel understands.

"Now you know," he concludes with a squeeze of his hand.

I wait quietly for him to look at me again and when he glances, quickly looking away before returning to my open gaze with a look of sweet hopefulness, I lean forward and press my lips against his in a gentle chaste kiss. He keeps his eyes closed as I lean back to look at him.

"Does that mean I was right?" he asks, his eyes still firmly closed and his face tilted towards me

"Right about what?"

"That you love me too?" He opens those bottomless blue eyes of his, sleepy and full of a growing desire.

"Let me see if I can make it clearer for you," I whisper and roll him into my embrace.

He is everything I have been trying not to imagine and more, passionate, considerate, intoxicating. Our kisses quickly become frenzied, our hands desperate to touch, to know everything about the other. Our bodies slide together - match up perfectly and begin to move as one, rocking a hypnotic rhythm in time to our panting breaths.

"Want you."

"Need you."

"Love you."

Our words tumble over each other like a litany. His hot hands trace delicate images on my chest, my belly and my thighs; his fingers count my ribs and comb through the hair on my chest. I am overwhelmed by the smoothness of his body, the subtle swell of the muscles of his back and arms as they flex and contract, ebb and flow like a tide beneath his skin. There is nothing else in the entire universe but this for me: Every sense I have, filled to bursting by him.

We are both exhausted by the emotional hours leading up to this and when our needy moans become sobs, begging for release, our eyes meet in perfect understanding. We can't wait any longer and there is no time for the gentle, thorough lovemaking we both want for our first time together; that will come later. Our hunger compels us and in perfect accord our hands reach between our sweat slick skin, confident and accurate. His hand is big and as he closes it in a fist around my desperate cock I can't help the long, low moan that escapes my lips. He arches his head back as my own rough hand encompasses his hot girth, already slippery with his excitement.

We both know this won't take long and we tangle our free hands in the hair at the back of our necks, seeking to clamp our mouths together as tightly as possible as we stroke the climax we so desperately need from the other. A feeling like fire shoots from my toes and fingers into my groin as I rip my lips from Daniel's and come in explosive waves, shooting onto his chest and mine. Daniel's eyes roll back in his head and his seed joins mine in pulse after pulse of hot thick fluid, covering our bellies and spattering our chins.

If anyone had told me that a night with Daniel would be like this, I would never have let him stay on Abydos that first time. I know we were both married, but my marriage was crumbling and his was sprung on him. If I'd known that he was the one I was meant to be with – which is so obvious to me now that I feel like a fucking fool for not realising before – I'd have brought him home and let him know every day how much I loved him, until he loved me back. Because he would have done eventually: the kind of connection we found in each other's arms tonight cannot be accidental. Each kiss, each touch and each breath were like pieces of a puzzle, the scattered parts of our spirits fitting together to make something that was whole and perfect - something that only we could make and only together.

I expected this first time with Daniel to be awkward and embarrassing and was prepared to have to relearn what it meant to be two men in bed together. I was not prepared for the opposite to happen – it was so easy, almost instinctive, just like dancing with him earlier. A sigh from him, a moan from me, we just knew. And when we came together, speaking each other's names as sweet release sent us spiralling into star-filled darkness, the tremors from our connection kept us clinging together for longer than the post climax shudders.

And so it is that I am watching my dozing archaeologist's face by the blue/green light of dawn as it creeps around the blinds and onto our bed. He's fighting sleep, as am I, forcing our eyes to stay open to savour each other's sated smiles. Finally he snuggles impossibly closer and sighs and we settle down to sleep.

"Ti amo," he says softly.

"Possedete il mio cuore - avete sempre," I reply in kind. He leans up to look me in the eye and I don't know who looks more surprised, him or me.

"I own your heart – I always have?" Daniel blinks at me.

"Well duh!" I grin at him. Well I'll be damned! I love him so much I DO speak Italian. One night of Daniel has done what four weeks of tests and evaluations by the Napoleonic Power Monger couldn't achieve; accessed part of the Ancient download I thought was gone forever. Wait until Janet hears that... or maybe not.

"Wow... that was almost romantic," Daniel says as he reclaims his place on my shoulder and wiggles to get comfy.

"Savour it – it won't happen again," I grumble against his ear. He sniggers, sighs and prepares to sleep. I card my fingers into his hair and close my eyes knowing that tomorrow will bring a shower, breakfast and then as long as we need to make love the way we want to: I'm an optimistic man and although it may kill me, I'm hoping for the whole day.

A muffled thumping wakes me and it feels like I have only just shut my eyes although the light flooding the bedroom from the hall tells me that time has passed. Daniel groans as I crane my neck to see the clock – 6.48 a.m.– so not much damn time. Enough time for Daniel to drool all over my neck and shoulder it would seem as I scoot out from under him.

"Wake up," I hiss. "There's someone at the door."

"Tell'm't'fuk'ff," my beloved snarls sweetly from beneath a pile of quilt.

More muffled thumping ensues and I can't ignore it any longer. I retrieve my shorts and shirt and blearily stagger to the front door. A quick glance confirms my worst fears – it's Carter and Teal'c. My favourite Jaffa appears to be holding a very pale astrophysicist up by the collar of her jacket. I open the door a crack, blinking into the sunshine.

"O'Neill," T announces, looking ridiculously fresh for a man in the clothes he wore last night.

"Guys – it's still night time," I tell them pathetically, letting the doorframe prop up my weary body.

"I told him that, he wouldn't listen," Sam moans, covering her eyes although she is wearing dark glasses already.

"We have come on a matter of some urgency, O'Neill," Teal'c says. Groaning inwardly I let the door swing open and watch them pass into the living room. I close the door with a bang that makes Carter go even paler and follow them.

"What is it, big guy?" I demand, getting straight to the point. I need to sleep, I need a shower, I need them to go before Daniel stumbles in here looking as thoroughly debauched as I look - although I don't think Carter would notice if I pulled on a sparkly Spandex number and started singing "Oh what a night".

Teal'c says nothing, but brings a brown bag up to my eye level. Is that what I think it is?

"I have procured Happy Meals," he intones proudly.

"But... but... they don't start serving burgers 'til eleven!" I protest stupidly. The juxtaposition of Ronald McDonald, a hungry Jaffa, a 2IC who looks like she has an appointment with the porcelain any moment and my fear that Daniel is about to out us in a massively spectacular fashion makes thinking a little difficult right now.

"They explained that to him...he said he'd wait," Sam bleats from behind her hands. Teal'c looks smug as I cast an appraising glance at his vast frame.

"How long?" I ask

"Three minutes and forty-six seconds," Teal'c supplies with a small smile.

"Can I smell breakfast?" Daniel asks, appearing around the corner, smiley, sleepy and looking good enough to eat.

"Indeed." Teal'c inclines his massive shiny head and proceeds to remove five gaudy boxes from his paper bag.

"Cool," Daniel grins and wanders off to the kitchen for coffee. The smell of the fries sends Carter scurrying off to the bathroom after going an interesting shade of pistachio. I'm way too relaxed and smug to care, so I go with the flow and snag one of Teal'c's proffered boxes.

"Why five? Feeling hungry?" I ask him.

"There are five requiring breakfast, O'Neill," Teal'c informs me from around his cheeseburger. "Skank is still sleeping..."

"In my truck?" I yelp, and run to the door with a lot more enthusiasm than I knew I had this morning.

The sight that greets me on my drive has my jaw scraping the doorstep. Skank is indeed occupying the back seat of my truck, his sweaty pink face pressed against the window; snoring so loud I can hear it from here. But that is not what has made me lose the power of speech.

Daniel places his chin on my shoulder as he peers out into the street. He placidly crams fries into his mouth as he takes in the scene.

"Ffffff...," I say. I clear my throat and try again. "Ffffffffffllllames."

"Professional job," Daniel says, offering me his Coke over my other shoulder.

"Daniel," I whimper, "can you see flames down the side of my truck?"

"Yep," he confirms solemnly, so it must be true. Orange flames with red highlights stencilled all down the side of my beautiful truck.

"Very you," he says, patting my ass as he wanders off. Carter chooses this moment to strike up a "Hallelujah Chorus" from the bathroom to accompany Skanks pneumatic drill snoring. Just as well she's a crack shot, 'cos I'm not clearing that up.

Teal'c and Carter have no idea how they have just lucked out by doing this today. Any day up to now and they would both have died a grisly and painful death at my hands, the hands of a man who buffs up his truck EVERY week. But today, well they could have... well I can't think of anything worse than what they have done to my truck, but they will get off scot-free. Until Daniel and I have our first fight of course... then they are both dead!

Fin

**Author's Note:**

> With thanks to Pie and Pepe.


End file.
